La Lanterna — Restaurant in Greater Brisbane

Back to La Lanterna for an [always] excellent dinner last Sunday night. We’ve been here a couple of times before and we always sat in the front section of the restaurant. Consequently I’d assumed that it was just a quaint little 20 seater but on Sunday they took us to the rear, rustic area, just like sitting in Tuscany garden. All wood and vine it’s quite the lovely setting to dine in. They have a friendly [very young] front of house staff but the Italian “man on the pans” is obviously well versed in regional Italian cooking. As soon as you sit down at their well set, bucolic tables, cold water arrives and menus are delivered with a smile. A delicious Campari aperol for me but I had to request some lemon wedges (my personal taste) to top it up. The drinks menu has a broad range of mainly Italian wines and it is well worth a deep dive to the “big reds” section because there’s some real bold, beauty, “belt you in the gob” wines in there. [hunt ‘em down] This menu is an eclectic blend of country Italian cooking with the chef’s personal touch to make for a special dining experience with dishes that we haven’t seen at other Italian restaurants. We started with a shared serve of La Lanterna foccacia. A lot thinner than the usual focaccia, toasted and spread with garlic and oil it’s a light and delicious start to dinner. We also shared a dish of Nannata. One of our la Lanterna faves with just a squeeze of lemon to top off perfectly cooked whitebait fritters. I’m a bit torn about this one. I usually prefer my whitebait complete, swimming on the plate coated with a crispy seasoning and flash fried but this dish makes for an interesting variation on a theme and whitebait is rarely seen on menus these days. My daughter ordered Gnocchi alla Sorrentina, my son went for Pappardelle all'Anatra, [one of my personal faves] his partner (celiac) ordered a custom pasta that they were quite happy to create for her, and I had the Tagliata di Manzo. All pastas are made on the premises [and can be bought separately to take home] and it shows. Fluffy, light Gnocchi swimming in a delicious tomato sauce and topped with an oven baked rich mozzarella cheese baked to golden perfection. The Gnocchi was melt in the mouth and sauce and cheese complimented it perfectly. The pappardelle was aldente excellence and topped of with delicious, tender chunks of duck in another wonderful Italian country sauce. The zero gluten pasta dish verdict was similarly positive and our friend was very impressed that they took the extra care to cater to her needs. Now, the steak! As usual it was a perfect, fat tinged sirloin slice. A great aged cut, cooked perfectly M/R [although I usually prefer my steaks a bit “redder”]. Dissected onto a crisp rocket salad with sweet roasted capsicum and it’s usually a tender, great experience here at La Lanterna. Unfortunately, tonight it was delivered cold. Most disappointing but I notified the helpful staff and the problem was rectified immediately. Just a slight hiccup on the night in this restaurant that obvs prides itself on extremely high standards. Not cheap but not expensive this is a a special, dainty little, shining light in the mass of restaurants on the beachfront at Redcliffe and we will, of course, be returning to La Lanterna. It’s too good not to. Do yourself a flavour and give La Lanterna a try. Strongly suggest booking before you go as seats...

Really disappointing evening for what I had hoped to be a special birthday meal. When we last visited La Lanterna we had a nice evening. Fairly premium price but worthy due to incredibly attentive service and good (although relatively small serving sizes) food. Booked thinking it would be a lovely venue for a special occasion.

They have two set "seating times". We eagerly arrived for our later seating and were very hungry. Fifteen minutes after arriving staff were still moving tables. We wouldn't have minded if we'd been able to order some wine, drinks and entrees but that had not been on offer as it seemed the changeover from earlier to later seating was taking a fairly long time.

Having just returned from a lengthy trip in Italy we were keen to experience the same warm hospitality. Unfortunately it wasn't to be the case. Very perfunctory, bare minimum service from a junior staff member. To be fair, he's obviously in training however there wasn't anyone actually checking in with how he was doing. He was polite but customer service skills very limited (as you'd expect at that age). At this price point we definitely expect the "extra mile" and it's possible this can only be provided by more senior, more experienced staff members. This is in no way a reflection of the young kid as he did a good job for his age. My query is more why no senior staff or the owner himself were checking in with customers. At this price, I'd expect it. Unlike our last visit there was no explanation or suggestion of menu items or the wine list. The owner did not make himself available to our table at any time during the evening.

$240 for a family of four, two adults and two kids. This was four mains, a small focaccia, bottle of wine, one soft drink and two desserts. Quite frankly, we all sort of felt we could have just eaten at one of our favourite takeout joints. Will not be returning sadly. Disappointing as it was an "occasion" meal and we'd really hoped to have a little of the same experience as we'd had during our months in Italy. We don't mind paying a higher price for meals but we do tend to have an expectation of a more premium dining and service experience once you go past a certain point with pricing.

EDIT: Wow. What an unprofessional response to a customer experience. Did this establishment actually go through booking and/or credit card details simply so that they could publish a customers details publicly online? The owner had actually phoned us a few days after our meal to explain that they had sick staff and apologise. At the time I thought that was very nice and thanked them for making the effort to do that. However they've chosen to frame a completely different response in a public forum. I don't believe that any of my family has ever been rude to staff in a restaurant (especially not to a junior who was obviously thrown in the deep end!!!). I stand by my original review. On this particular evening visiting their restaurant was not a good customer experience for the price point. To see how they choose to respond is (again) really disappointing. Please be careful giving your details to this establishment...

Dear Prospective Diner. TLDR; Fantastic Food, Wine & Service. Numerous GF and GFMO (Gluten free related). Yummy Desserts.

My friend and I are very grateful for our experience at La Lanterna last Saturday night (5Oct24). Please pardon the following narrative -Typically, I don’t write such narratives but I feel that our experience is worth it.

We arrived at a full, bustling restaurant with a waitlist of diners (In Redcliffe?! Wow) -Fool us for not reserving a table. Soon after, an absolutely charming older gentleman (maybe the owner) offered to set up a special table out the front so we didn’t have to wait -That suited us and our conversation so we accepted.

The service was fantastic from the lovely young man and woman even though we were the only ones out the front –for me, out of sight is out of mind. We were rewarded for asking for a wine recommendation as we got the most beautiful wine. Here I commit a faux pas –I don’t know the name. It was on the pink “extra special wine” list :-D. [Edit: Wine = Lagrein. Please correct me if I am wrong].

My friend was pleased with the numerous & tasty gluten free/modified options even though it was an Italian restaurant. Tip: If you, ahem, book a table, it is possible to get extra GF options.

The mains and desserts that we shared were wonderful. They were so full of flavour. If I had to choose which one I could only eat then I would have trouble doing so. That said, the Spezzatino ai Porcini was particularly moorish 😃.

For those interested, we ordered the GFO variants of: Tagliatelle al Ragù - [GF} Traditional beef and pork ragù tomato based. -Good GF Pasta. Spezzatino ai Porcini -[GF] Beef hotpot with porcini mushrooms and fresh focaccia. (Ohh la la, the hot pot) Desserts: Pannacotta alla Fragola -Strawberry pannacotta topped with chocolate ganache. [GF] "Joe's Brownie" -Hand made brownies with vanilla sauce and white chocolate mousse. [GF]

I am very much looking forward to going back again soon. I am surprised I haven’t been...